Akita Nairiku Onsen Kakunodate

Akita Nairiku Onsen Kakunodate is a thermal bathing facility serving Kakunodate, a remarkably well-preserved samurai castle town in Semboku City, Akita Prefecture, celebrated as one of Japan's most atmospheric historical townscapes and sometimes called the Kyoto of Tohoku for its magnificent inner samurai district (bukeyashiki-chō) where the earthen walls and black-gated compounds of historic samurai residences line a wide avenue of ancient weeping cherry trees whose cascading branches create one of Japan's most celebrated spring blossom spectacles each late April. The town is also a center of kabazaiku, the traditional Akita craft of fashioning cherry bark — specifically the distinctive bark of the Japanese wild cherry (yamazakura) — into tea caddies, vases, and boxes using a technique that originated in the samurai district and is now designated a national traditional craft of Japan, producing objects of extraordinary natural beauty from the glistening grain and rich brown tones of the mountain cherry bark. The sodium-bicarbonate thermal waters here serve visitors to one of Tohoku's most culturally complete historical townscapes, where the pleasures of cherry blossoms, samurai architecture, and traditional craft combine with hot spring bathing in a destination of rare and integrated Japanese cultural depth.